Thanksgiving hoops viewing guide: Seton Hall men, Princeton women and more
Seton Hall faces No. 23 USC on Thursday, the Princeton women have a challenging slate in Florida and other New Jersey teams will be in action this weekend.
Thanksgiving, historically, is an NFL holiday. The NBA won’t compete with it. The NHL, which has seven teams based in a country that celebrates Thanksgiving in October, won’t compete with it. College football outside Mississippi won’t compete with it.
College basketball looks at all that room on the plate and asks for seconds of the stuffing and potatoes.
“Feast Week,” as it’s marketed today, has become a sport-wide festivity. Not every Division I team is jetting off to Cancun or Las Vegas this week, but it can feel that way.
These early four-team or eight-team tournament have the capacity to create titanic early-season matchups, as we saw in Hawaii this week with No. 2 Purdue taking down No. 4 Marquette (after Marquette beat No. 1 Kansas) to win the Maui Invitational.
One New Jersey team has already wrapped up its Feast Week tournament by the time you’re reading this. Seton Hall women’s basketball played in the Baha Mar Hoops Pink Flamingo Championship in the Bahamas, where the Pirates lost to USC by 10 on Monday before beating East Carolina 68-57 on Wednesday. Azana Baines had 24 points on Wednesday as Tony Bozzella earned his 500th victory as a head coach across four colleges.
Here’s my quick preview of the five other Jersey teams playing in tournaments or multi-team events this weekend.
(All times ET and p.m. unless otherwise noted.)
MEN
Seton Hall
Rady Children’s Invitational, San Diego
Game 1: No. 23 USC, Thursday at 5:30, FS1
Game 2: Either Oklahoma or Iowa, Friday at 3:30 or 6, FOX
Seton Hall traditionally plays in one of these tournaments, placing a disappointing fourth in the ESPN Events Invitational last year and also featuring in the Fort Myers Tip-Off and Battle 4 Atlantis in recent years. For the inaugural Rady Children’s Invitational, the Pirates had the furthest distance to travel and almost certainly the most trouble getting there. In a pre-tournament media call with reporters, Shaheen Holloway revealed the team left campus at 8 a.m. Tuesday and didn’t get to San Diego till 6:30 – Pacific time.
If they can brush that off with a good day Wednesday practice and adjust to the time zone, today’s game should be a fantastic showdown of backcourt talent. Seton Hall has Kadary Richmond, who leads the Big East with 2.75 steals per game, and USC has Boogie Ellis, a tremendous scoring point guard. Seton Hall has Al-Amir Dawes, a veteran who showed a lot in his first year with the Pirates, and USC has Isaiah Collier, a freshman who might just be the No. 1 pick in next year’s NBA draft. Holloway said he expects the Trojans to put not Ellis but Kobe Johnson, their defensive stopper, on Richmond. (Bronny James, son of LeBron, is not yet playing for USC as he recovers from a cardiac event this summer.)
Seton Hall played both Iowa and Oklahoma last season and lost both games, but both those teams have far different rosters this season.
Monmouth
Cathedral of College Basketball Classic, Philadelphia
Game 1: Belmont, Friday at 2, ESPN+
Game 2: Lafayette, Saturday at 2, ESPN+
Game 3: Penn, Sunday at 2:30, ESPN+
King Rice always has Monmouth play a tough schedule so I think the Hawks are ready for that three-games-in-three-days grind. They are deep, too, as evidenced by their win at West Virginia earlier this month.
That said, the rapid-fire pace of games back to back could allow Monmouth to try different players and lineup combinations while giving starters proper rest. In Sunday’s newsletter, I discussed how Rice devised a group of three freshmen and two sophomores to play meaningful minutes in the second half against Princeton. Those three freshmen – Cornelius Robinson Jr., Abdi Bashir Jr. and Gabe Spinelli – scored during their time on the court together, so maybe they get more run as a group in one of these games
Penn, hosting this tournament at the fabled Palestra, is Monmouth’s final matchup. Think that’ll be a good one? The Quakers just beat Villanova last week and have Clark Slajchert, a scoring threat who will go toe to toe with Xander Rice.
Fairleigh Dickinson
Urban-Bennett Memorial Classic, Moon Township, Pa.
Game 1: Jacksonville, Saturday at 4, ESPN+
Game 2: Robert Morris, Sunday at 2, ESPN+
FDU is off to a nice 4-2 start, with its road win over Buffalo and a one-point thriller over Saint Peter’s. Ansley Almonor is off to a rip-roaring start with 15.8 points and 5.3 rebounds per game, and Jo’el Emanuel is looking to take Almonor’s mantle of Northeast Conference Most Improved Player with his 12.3-point, 5.2-rebound start to the year.
The Jacksonville Dolphins are No. 265 in KenPom’s ratings, and Robert Morris, the tournament host, is No. 261. It’s a nice set of matchups at this time of year for an FDU team that spends most of the season facing teams around New Jersey, the New York City metro and points north.
WOMEN
Rutgers
South Point Classic, Las Vegas
Game 1: Texas Tech, Friday at 9:30, FloHoops
Game 2: Boise State, Saturday at 9:30, FloHoops
Rutgers lost to Fairfield 78-54 at home this weekend, so I’m reminded of those old “Wanna get away?” commercials. A trip out west and a change of scenery might be what the Scarlet Knights need to get back on track.
Unfortunately for the Knights, Texas Tech and Boise State are both undefeated and playing some of the best defense in the sport. Texas Tech ranks top-40 in scoring defense (52.6 ppg allowed) while Boise State has yielded just 46 per game, fourth in the country. I want to see how Destiny Adams and Kaylene Smikle, Rutgers’ best offensive threats, fare against those defenses.
Princeton
Women’s Fort Myers Tip-Off, Fort Myers, Fla.
Game 1: No. 22 Oklahoma, Thursday at 3, stream on FSWBucs.com
Game 2: No. 21 Indiana, Saturday at 11 a.m., stream on FSWBucs.com
The Tigers’ lone loss so far is a three-point heartbreaker at then-No. 3 UCLA. As usual, they can hang with the best teams in the country. That’s what this trip south will provide.
The fourth team in this event is none other than Tennessee, meaning based purely on AP poll votes, you’ve got four of the 30 best teams in women’s college hoops all in one place. (Lost in the shuffle of the Princeton men receiving 10 votes in Monday’s poll was the Princeton women receiving six.)
I haven’t gotten to cover the Princeton women yet this season, which will change when they host Seton Hall next week. They’ve clearly reloaded, as three of their top five scorers right now are all freshmen: Skye Belker (10.5 ppg), Mari Bickley (6.0) and Ashley Chea (4.0).
But the accessibility to watch these games is beyond disappointing. In an age where the ESPN+ inventory is constantly growing, stuffed like a Thanksgiving turkey with mid-major and low-major men’s college basketball, Princeton vs. the reigning Big Ten regular-season champion is going to be streamed on the website of the junior college hosting the game? How? Did an actual broadcaster drop the ball? I’ll catch up after the fact, because I’m not trying to set up a janky livestream on a laptop nearby our Thanksgiving dinner table. Women’s hoops deserve better than this.